In Real Life

"Anda loves Coarsegold Online, the massively-multiplayer role playing game that she spends most of her free time on. It's a place where she can be a leader, a fighter, a hero. It's a place where she can meet people from all over the world, and make friends. But things become a lot more complicated when Anda befriends a gold farmer -- a poor Chinese kid whose avatar in the game illegally collects valuable objects and then sells them to players from developed countries with money to burn. This behavior is strictly against the rules in Coarsegold, but Anda soon comes to realize that questions of right and wrong are a lot less straightforward when a real person's real livelihood is at stake" --cover flap.

Comment

I adore the art here in this story about a multiplayer online game and how the experience is different depending on if you're in the West or the East. Other pluses are the girls playing games, and the learning about unions. A very good read.

Anda makes a friend on her favorite massively multiplayer online role-playing game, and is confronted with a real world look at her clash of cultures between her poor, gold-farming friend and the affluent players.

This is definitely a book that’s Trying To Tell You Something! But the central character, teenage girl Anda, has a fully developed personality, and the plot has some surprises, so I can forgive it the heavy-handed message. Anda’s experience with the online multiplayer game “Coarsegold Online” shows the power of video games and online spaces to connect people who might not otherwise see each other. The book is about making mistakes, and being forgiven, which is something we can all benefit from reflecting on. Wang’s art here made me want to track down more of her work!